(REMOTE: Dec. 16, 2022): Students from Colorado’s Stargate Charter School and Windsor Middle School took top honors in this year’s annual radon awareness poster contest, and students from Pagosa Springs High School took top honors in the radon awareness video contest.
Elia Junyent, a sixth-grader from Stargate Charter School, won first place and earned $300 for her submission. Her poster will be entered in the National Radon Poster Contest, sponsored by the Conference of Radiation Control Program Directors, the American Lung Association, and the Environmental Protection Agency. Her poster will be displayed on the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment’s radon website www.coloradoradon.info for 2023.
Irelyn French, from Windsor Middle School, earned second place and $200. Byron Percy, also from Windsor Middle School, received third place and $100.
Kaylee Henlse, Alaura Hughes, and Olivia Cardenas, from Pagosa Springs High School, received first place in the radon awareness video contest, $300, and their video will be entered into the National Radon Video Contest.
“These contests are a fun way to educate students and encourage residents to test their homes for radon,” said Jill Hunsaker Ryan, executive director, Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment. “Radon testing is easy to do, and it’s the only sure way to tell whether your home is affected by radon, which occurs naturally in the soil.”
The teachers of the top four students received $100 gift cards as well.
Long-term exposure to radon — a colorless and odorless radioactive gas — is the leading cause of lung cancer in nonsmokers and the second-leading cause of lung cancer in smokers. Exposure to radon is responsible for approximately 500 lung cancer deaths in Colorado each year.
For more information about radon, visit www.coloradoradon.info.
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